


Scrabbling

by LostGirl



Series: Second Glances [3]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Angst, Insecure!Wesley, Introspection, M/M, POV Alternating, Word Games
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-10-14
Updated: 2004-10-14
Packaged: 2018-06-01 19:51:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6534145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostGirl/pseuds/LostGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A game of scrabble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scrabbling

**Author's Note:**

> Title: Scrabbling  
> Author: Lostgirl  
> Paring: Giles/Wesley  
> Rating: R (technically)  
> Spoilers: Set late season 3, BTVS.  
> Summary: A game of scrabble.
> 
> Disclaimer: All things BTVS (and ATS) belong to Joss Whedon and various corporate entities.
> 
> Big thanks and hugs to [](http://kyrieane.livejournal.com/profile)[**kyrieane**](http://kyrieane.livejournal.com/) and [](http://beadtific.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://beadtific.livejournal.com/)**beadtific** for the wonderful betas!

Wesley knew he had to get up. He'd already missed one day and the little voice was nagging him, wouldn't shut its mouth. Sighing, he pushed aside the covers and lay there, staring at the ceiling.

He knew he'd have to move. He still had duties, responsibilities. Those didn't go away just because he'd acted like a bloody prat and humiliated himself. He should have thrown the picture away, should-- _shouldn't have stolen it in the first place, shouldn't have even looked at it you stupid, useless, child._ Cringing, not only at the thoughts, but because the memory of the pictures still _did_ things to him, Wesley forced back a sob.

Sitting up, he looked at the clock. He actually had what he'd have normally thought of as an excessive amount of time to get ready, but given the panic attack he'd had trying to get dressed the day before . . . well, perhaps he should have gotten up a little sooner.

Sighing, Wesley tried to calm the rolling of his stomach. Saturday, just after . . . just after, had been the worst. The hang over, combined with the memories of what he'd done-- _and weren't those supposed to be gone? Or at least not so blasted clear?_ \--had kept him friendly with the bathroom floor.

He hadn't even attempted to eat until Sunday, and that had . . . well, at least he'd been able to keep things down until the panic attack. Wesley's biggest--only--comfort was that Giles . . . Mr. Giles, would never tell the children what had happened. Still, he'd be trapped in the library with the other man . . . all day. Mr. Giles would probably want little to do with him--which was good, it was, he kept telling himself--but just knowing the other man was there, was in the same room. And if he had to look at him? If he had to try to look Mr. Giles in the eye? If he didn't act normally, the children would know something was going on. They'd ask questions, they'd . . . oh, god.

Wesley slumped back onto the bed, forcing his breathing to be calmer, more regular.

 _He must hate me._ Loathe _me. So pathetic . . . so . . . so disgusting._ Shuddering, Wesley once again forced his breathing to return to normal, ignoring the hot prickling in his eyes. _What does it matter? Really? He didn't exactly like me before. It isn't as if he would have . . . seen me, or . . ._

And why couldn't he get the memory of those lips out of his mind? It wasn't as if it had been spectacular, or . . . anything at all. Just a brush, a touch of pressure that had ended so quickly that . . .

 _God, get a grip on yourself. Stop this whining and_ move _already_.

*****

Giles couldn't keep himself from glancing up at the door. It was lunchtime and still Wesley hadn't shown up. He hadn't come in yesterday at all, hadn't even called. While Giles was certain he knew the reasons for the man's absence, he was actually beginning to worry. If Wesley didn't show up today he planned to go to the man's apartment and work things out. This meant he needed to have some clear idea of how he felt before then. Not an easy task.

He was angry and embarrassed, of course. The man had rifled items he found very personal, his memories. Wesley had had no right. Still, he couldn't find it in himself to be outraged because he was so very baffled. What had driven Wesley, who, from everything Giles had seen, was a practically slavish to the laws of tradition and proper behavior, to go through something that was obviously not meant for public viewing?

More over, what had the man been thinking to take one of the pictures? The puzzle overrode his anger and embarrassment. He couldn't understand, and therefore had to, and then, of course, there was more to the puzzle.

"Your turn," Willow reminded him, poking his elbow.

"Hmm?" He asked, giving her a baffled expression. Rolling her eyes, Willow pointed to the scrabble board on the library table. "Oh. Oh, yes." Sighing, Giles turned his mind back to the game, ignoring the chatter between Willow and Xander, concentrating instead on the letters from which his mind was too distracted to make much sense.

Oh, he found the word 'prat' easily enough, but somehow he didn't think he should be spelling that out for the children. That didn't, of course, mean he wasn't calling himself one. He should have seen the attraction, right away. If . . . in fact, there was one. Wesley had taken that picture, had kissed him.

The kiss, though, Giles had assumed to be experimentation. He'd assumed Wesley had had a revelation about his own sexuality. Giles had actually been a little hurt that he seemed like a 'safe' target upon which to experiment. Then the picture muddled it all up again. If Wesley had taken that nearly two weeks before hand . . . well, it was possible the pictures themselves had triggered Wesley's . . . revelation, if that it was. Still, there was nothing to say Wesley hadn't known he was attracted to men before hand, so . . .

He needed to talk to Wesley. They needed to talk to one another. If . . . if it were an attraction . . . well, he might not be adverse to following it, seeing where it led, but . . . he had to know first, had to know what the other man had been thinking, had to understand before anything else could take root in his mind.

He understood, he thought, Wesley's motivations in coming to him that first night, injured and unwilling to go to the hospital. Things had gone well enough, in his estimation. They'd chatted, which was something he and Wesley had certainly never done. He'd thought, that night, that perhaps Wesley might not be the adversary he'd been seeing. They had things in common, understood one another when they spoke. It would have been nice to continue in that vein. And, yes, Giles couldn't deny that was physically attracted to the man, but Wesley was hardly the first man he'd found handsome or had sexual thoughts about. He'd thought Wesley straight; the possibility of more than camaraderie hadn't been present. He was fine with that.

He'd actually been upset to wake up the next morning and find Wesley gone. More, though, he'd been confused. For the first time in nearly a year, he'd thought he might have someone to talk to, another adult and one who understood the pressures of the world they lived in. What had he done, said, that had caused Wesley to run like that? There had to be a reason. Had something he'd done or said made Wesley uncomfortable? Made him feel unwelcome? If that weren't the case, he'd have expected some explanation when they saw one another the next day. Wesley had been silent however. He'd said nothing at all. Not about the wound, or about his leaving. He'd ignored the subject entirely, which, to Giles, seemed to indicate that something had happened, something Wesley did not want to discuss or at least not with him.

Sighing, Giles shook his head, wandering through the maze of half-thoughts with little idea how to bring it all together. Then Wesley had shown up drunk on his doorstep and Giles . . . had felt as if he were being used as a convenient 'friendly-ear'. Good enough company to listen to another's problems, but not enough to be a friend.

It had hurt, but Wesley had been pissed out of his skull and Giles unwilling to throw him out. So, he'd done what he had to, listened. He'd watched too, though. The practice was so trained into him he couldn't have stop if he tried, but he'd found himself wanting to. Looking for some clue as to what had caused the man to leave that first night, what had caused the man to turn up on his doorstep. And he'd seen something, but not what he'd expected, not something he could quantify.

The library doors opened and the center of his thoughts for the last four days walked in. Giles examined him closely for a long moment before turning his eyes back to the scrabble letters, giving up and using an already placed 't' to spell 'rapt'. Wesley looked pale, sleepless and quite agitated. Giles didn't know what to say in front of the children--wasn't even quite sure what to say without an audience--so he settle for a fairly friendly greeting that would let Wes know he'd covered for him.

"Wesley. I didn't think we'd be seeing you today. Though, I suppose the stomach flu is rather fiddly."

"Hey, Wes," Willow added to his welcome, waving. Xander ignored Wesley, concentrating on his tiles.

Wesley didn't look at them as he headed toward the office, acknowledging the greetings with a clearly nervous, "H-hello. Uh, f-feeling much better. Thought I'd come in for, ah, a bit."

"That's good. These things don't usually last long. Once you get over the initial bout. Things can clear up fairly easily." Giles congratulated himself on sounded disinterested, hoping his message was getting across.

"Why don't you join us, Wes? Giles could use the help. It's Xander and I against him and he's distracted," Willow rolled her eyes at him and Giles had to bite his tongue to keep from snapping that he was not.

"Uh, well, it's-it's fairly difficult to have a Thoryan text running through your mind while you're trying to-to spell in English," he muttered, eyes flicking to Wesley who stood at the door to the office, watching them with the strangest expression.

"You, uh, want-want me to play . . . scrabble with you?"

Giles couldn't decipher Wes' tone, which was most of their problem. Or, at least, a big part of it. He found it difficult to read the man. In their fairly limited non-work interactions, Wesley's mood seemed to change quickly, triggered most of the time by who knew what. Giles was often left with the sense that if he could just find the key piece of the puzzle, the rest would fall into place, but he'd be damned if he knew how do that with Wesley.

"Sure," Xander muttered, giving Willow a look. "Cause we _want_ a non-distracted linguist in a game against the two of us. It'll be . . . depressing."

Giles had to stifle a chuckle a second later when Xander's eyes darted to Willow, his hand going under the table to rub against, what Giles guessed to be, a fairly well-bruised shin.

"Er, uh, all right." Wesley slipped into the chair next to Willow, his eyes focused on the board, his hands lying on the table in front of him.

"We just started, so I don't think throwing you in will cause problems," Willow told him with a too-cheerful smile. Giles examine the girl as she held out the bag for Wesley to pull his tiles out, wondering what she was up to, or whether he was simply being too paranoid.

Shaking his head, Giles blinked down at his new letters and then at the board.

"All right. It's your turn, Wes. Xander just spelled 'rapture' from Giles' 'rapt'. Nice going, partner!"

"Right, uh, partners, then?" There was a slight croak in Wesley's voice, but Giles didn't think the others had noticed.

"Not such a disagreeable notion, is it?" Giles asked with a glance at the younger man, only to see Wesley go a little pale. God, what had he said now?

"Right. So . . ." Wesley blinked at the board and Giles watched his eyelashes flutter against the lenses of his glasses. Shaking his head at himself, he turned his own eyes back to the board.

\------

Wesley forced his hand to stop trembling, his stomach to quiet. His eyes studied the laid-out tiles, but his mind was still with Giles' comment. What had the man meant by that? Had it been a jibe? Poking at his . . . imagination? Wesley felt the blood drain from his face at that thought, his stomach churning.

God, he felt sick with the humiliation and, yet, he couldn't run. Couldn't let himself abandon his duty, his responsibility, and . . . he wanted to be here. Or rather, he wanted, almost desperately, to _fit_ here. At this table. Playing scrabble with two children and a librarian on school lunch break . . . god, what was _wrong_ with him? Why did he want this? Was he this pathetic?

It didn’t feel that way though. It didn't feel pathetic, or as if he were some lonely failure basking in whatever companionship was offered. If felt good to be invited. He'd watched, surreptitiously, while Willow and Giles played. Sometimes Xander would join in and other times just watch. Sometimes Buffy would come in and she and Xander would snark back and forth, Willow and Giles chipping in on the other's turn. Oz came by as well, occasionally, and he was always welcomed into the circle. A grace he accepted with little more than a nod. Faith, sometimes, even showed up early. Even she had a place here.

Why didn't he?

"The letters aren't going to change just because you stare at them." Xander snorted, pulling Wesley from his thoughts.

"Oh, yes, right." Without more than a thought, Wes put out an 'e', a 'n' and a 'd'. "Enraptured. Triple word score."

"Shucks." Willow muttered, the counterpoint to Xander's mock-glare at her almost making Wesley smile, almost.

"Well, he's not as distracted as I wanted," Xander sighed dramatically.

"Oh, your just mad cause I kicked you," Willow laughed. "Don't worry. We'll still beat 'em! I beat Giles yesterday."

"I'm sure you cheated," Giles quipped and Wesley watched Willow put on an indignant face.

"And you're just mad because I took your word three or four times. I really don't know what you were thinking," she shook her head, going back to examining her tiles.

"I had something on my mind," Giles quickly defended and Wesley slumped into his chair a little more, wondering.

"So we've noticed," Xander snorted, as Willow took her turn. "You were eyeball deep in distracted Saturday too. Buffy nearly chopped your head off with that axe."

"Her reflexes are better than that," Giles contradicted, though he said nothing about his own mental state, Wesley noted. Watching as Giles spelled out 'forgive', his eye flickering up to meet Wesley's.

Looking back at the board with a blink, Wes glanced at Willow and Xander to find them both oblivious and concentrating on the game. He turned his eyes back to Giles, swallowing hard before meeting the man's gaze head on. He mouthed, 'you forgive me?'

Giles raised both eyebrows at that, giving him a confused look. For a heartbeat, Wesley cursed himself for seeing significance where there was none, and then Giles nodded and motioned to the office.

 _Oh, god._ Wesley glanced over at office door, trying to keep his breathing normal. Giles wanted to talk to him alone. God, he probably wanted to ask why again and what the hell was Wesley supposed to say? That the picture had turned him on . . . immensely? That he'd liked to lie back at night and pretend it was his cock between Giles' lips as his hand moved over hard flesh. That just the thought began to stir his prick and make his mouth go dry?

Wesley cursed himself. _Pathetic. Disgusting._

His heart was pounding, trying to think of some way to get out of this. Some way to get Giles to ignore it. Pretend in never happened and let it fade away into the past. Giles wasn't going to do that though and now Giles' eyes were on him, waiting for an answer to his unspoken question.

"Wes? It's your turn." Blinking at Xander, Wesley looked down at the board and then at his tiles.

"Oh . . . right," Wesley blinked, trying to make sense out of the letters before him, ignoring Xander's snort.

\------

Giles glanced at the clock, willing himself to keep from tapping his fingers on the tabletop. Lunch would be over in a just a few moments. Wesley and he would have the library to themselves to sort things.

The problem was that he didn't know exactly what they were sorting. As he no longer trusted his perceptions of Friday night and Wesley had been pissed out of his mind to begin with. That left them with only the events before hand, which, he knew, were a large part of Wesley's current attitude. He'd never seen the man so sheepish, so . . . visibly uncertain. It was both illuminating and worrisome. The only thing he was sure of was that he didn't like it . . . at all.

The scene between Wes and himself Friday must have been humiliating for the man. Giles knew that, had he been caught in such a situation, he'd have been mortified. His few glimpses into Wesley's . . . into _Wesley_ had left him concerned. There was something lurking under the surface and Giles couldn't put his finger on what. The puzzle intrigued him, hell, _the man_ intrigued him.

Some detached part of his mind found it interesting how quickly he went from viewing the man as an adversary, his replacement, to something more close to a . . . well, he wasn't sure. Now that he looked, he could see that Wes and he were in a similar situation here, and yet he couldn't say they were compatriots as that implied a level of friendliness they'd shared exactly once.

He had no idea how to categorize Wesley in his life and that, too, intrigued him. Watching as Wesley spelled out 'alone' using the 'o' in 'forgive' and the 'e' in 'enraptured', he raised an eyebrow and then shook his head.

It was a game of Scrabble, for the love of heaven, how much could it tell you?


End file.
